Mutagen

<strong>Day 22 – 9:11 AM – Barangay Daraitan, Tanay, Rizal</strong>

While the cracking noises sounded from under his foot and loud thuds from the falling bodies from every swing of his sword, Mark started to notice that the road he was running on was basically a graveyard for both human and beasts. The cracking sound did not come from the stones or gravel on the road but from the bones of both animals and humans that scattered on the area. Aside from the bones, there were also a lot of abandoned bags and equipment left by the tourists everywhere. The road also started to become cemented as he left the outskirts into the central area.

During his run, Mark could not help check one of the larger bags and saw the several neatly folded clothes inside along with equipment necessary for travel. Seeing the contents of the bag, Mark hurriedly put it to the side and made a mental reminder to pick it up later. The clothes were musty and bag was dirty but the other items inside could surely be of use in the mountains.

After leaving the bag and encountering more infected, both humans and animals, he started to take notice of the untouched street side general merchandise stores. He stopped for a bit and peered through the window and saw the rows and rows of canned goods, packed junk food and other things commonly found in small stores. This untouched store made him sure that no survivors managed to scavenge from this place since the outbreak. There might be others that tried but likely failed. It also confirmed that this place was one of the ground zeros of the outbreak due to the crashed airplane.

This place was too dangerous for normal people. To Mark on the other hand, this was a treasure trove.

As long as all the infected in this place did not gang up on him, he was sure that he could come and go as much as he could. Besides, he had Amihan who could lure away the infected safer with more efficiency. It seemed that this would not be his last trip here. He was even sure that he would frequent this place until everything that could be scavenged was looted by him.

The thought of cleaning up the infected in this place slowly and making the base here since there was already structures also came into his mind. Thinking about the pros and cons however, the scrapped the idea. The biggest and most important reason was that the only water source in this area was the Ungos River which the water could be contaminated for the most part. Not only for sure that this river flows along several communities and the longer the river was, the more likely for stray infected to get dragged by the water especially during floods.

Right now, he did not see any washed away infected maybe due to the fact that the river around this place was on the shallow side but he could nor risk it further. He was not afraid of the unstable strain on the saliva of the infected to contaminate the river though. He noticed it before when he tried to store the saliva inside a jar. Though it managed to stay the way it was inside the sealed jar, being exposed to the air and being diluted in water disperses the saliva out of existence.

Though, since it had been long since the outbreak started, Mark just wished that it did not change. Well, it was very unlikely or else, he would not be able to see Hallie and Nicole's group of survivors after they crossed the river.

Finally, Mark found the barangay hall. Obviously, it was deserted. After he cleared the infected outside, he made his way inside the barangay hall before closing the gate. There were several infected inside but they were only Biters and Eaters which did not take long to eliminate. The people here probably experienced a bitter struggle. There were a lot of dried up blood stains on the walls and the concrete covered yard. The glass main door and the windows were all broken into pieces while a lot of stuff around was overturned.

There seemed that the place had no separate building for the health center making him enter the main building. There, he saw what he was looking for. It was the room which looked like a clinic. Still, he did not immediately enter the place but looked around the building while carefully illuminating the infected inside. After killing all the infected inside the barangay hall, he finally entered the consultation room and started to open the cabinets one by one and checked for the medicine he could find.

For sure, there was not too much but he was able to find several blister packs of paracetamol tablets, loperamide capsules and amoxicillin capsules. There were also a few bottles vitamin supplements. Luckily, none of the items were past its expiration date. He put all the medicine in his bag including several rolls of gauze, small bottles of iodine solution and two bottles of hydrogen peroxide. The assortment of medicine was very few but he got what he needed which was very good.

If he tried to look inside lounging areas first though, he might have to spend more time searching.

When he walked out the main door with a good mood, the eaters had already started to clog the area outside gate. Some even started to climb up the fences. It seemed that even though not all, some infected started to develop the ability to climb lower walls and obstacles. Unexpectedly, the first one to managed climbing up the fence was the same pregnant infected he saw earlier. It seemed that it lagged behind due to the heavy baggage she was carrying.

Looking at how big the woman's belly was, it was likely that she was already due this month. When the woman managed to climb over the fence, he plopped unto the ground squishing her belly in the process. Mark who was always emotionless shivered at the thought of an infected baby suddenly spurting out of the woman like a rocket. His imagination was really good at kicking up in uncanny times. What he thought however did not happen and the infected pregnant woman stood up with a bit of difficulty.

Several infected soon followed over the fence. Counting the number, there was seven and several more trying to climb up. Mark then started to face the incoming infected slashing the pregnant woman first. Her head rolled away and her body slid on the already bloody ground squishing her bloated belly once more. Ignoring the first body, Mark started to clear the other infected before he escape the place.

He could have escaped already but he was eying the mountain bike parked at the side of the barangay hall. Its wheels were slightly out of air but there was an air pump tied up on its body. If he wanted to take it out safely, it was better if he reduce the number of the infected outside.

In the midst of eliminating the infected that managed to climb up the fence, he noticed a fast moving shadow moving on fours at the corner of his eyes. He hurriedly jumped back to dodge letting the shadow pass in front of him. Seeing the body of the fast moving shadow, his eyes dilated for the first time in a while.

It was not a new infected or even an infected animal. The one moving fast in all fours was the headless body of the pregnant woman. Her body was facing up and her limbs bent like spider legs towards her back like some possessed child in an exorcism movie. The only difference was that her body was headless and the one facing him was her sensitive part. As her maternity clothes were all torn up, her underwear was all exposed for him to see because of her strange position.

With a burst of blood which made him dodge once more, a bloody hole appeared on her bloated belly with a deformed face of an infant sticking out of the hole. The head was squished on its left side causing its right eye to almost pop out of its skull while its other eye was basically nothing but a bloody socket. Normally, even a newly born baby had bad eyesight but this one was able to turn its popped out eye towards him looking at him with a bloodthirsty stare.

If Amihan was here, not mention about screaming, she might have already fainted. This scene was basically stuff from a grotesque nightmare.

As normal to the infected, the baby that took over her mother's body started to charge again towards him with a small but bloodthirsty cry. It seemed that the cry agitated the other infected and they attacked more aggressively.

"That infected pregnant woman was not normal infected after all."

Mark muttered as he fought off the agitated infected. It seems that he needed to abandon the mountain bike for now. The infected outside the gate started to let out agitated cries and would surely attract the lured away infected if it had gone for too long. He had already found and taken his main purpose in this place anyway. He just needed to stop by the street store to get some seasoning and food along with the bag he left on the street side and leave. But first, he should take care of the mutated baby though. Mark was sure that he would not be able to lose it if he just ran to escape.

'A baby inside a mother's womb could be considered as an unborn angel but if the baby turned out to be an infected, it was nothing but a parasite.'

He thought as he faced another charge from that grotesque infant.

With a wave of his left hand, his palm split open and three [Blood Whips] burst out charging towards the mutated baby's head. As the tips of the whips was done solidifying into pointed stingers, three more holes was added to the baby's face and its mother's headless body rolled several times to the ground before it stopped moving.

The infected around was still agitated and Mark hurriedly jumped over the fence further away from the congestion of the infected.

Unexpectedly, even the supposed to be Eaters started running towards him like Biters. It seemed that their agitation did not only apply on their attacks but also on their movements. It would be hard to escape without eliminating every single agitated infected.

'Time to try that move huh?'

Mark was not fazed facing the agitated infected despite their number that was more than two dozen.

His eyes turned sharper as the three [Blood Whips] on his palm retracted. Then, six [Blood Whips] burst out from his back even creating holes on his clothes. Each whip was one and a half meter in length and three centimeters thick. This was the highest number and the best length and size he could control. Then, the shapes of the whip started to distort and solidify creating segmented armor on each of the whip. Each segment had a single short blade on it making each whip look like a sword whip that could be seen being used by some anime characters.

As the whips moved, the metallic clicking could be heard. He then charged towards the infected. Though using this attack style seemed to make his movement a little slower due to the loss of blood inside his body, he was not worried about it. With the armored bladed whips moving around his body, he was nothing short of a meat grinder right now.

The whips would lash on the infected and due to the multiple blades, not only the necks of the infected were getting decapitated but also their limbs and other body parts. Not only blood splattered on the ground but also a lot of grinded off flesh from the infected along with the decapitated heads and limbs.

As soon as he killed off the last agitated infected, he immediately fled the area. Now that the infected around was all ellimnated, he wanted to take the mountain bike with him, however, he could feel his sense of danger tingling fiercely. It was likely that a lot mutated infected was attracted due to the disturbance just now. If he wanted to get more supplies and carry the tourist bag away, he needed to run away as soon as possible and move discreetly.